


21 Days Till I Don't Miss You

by McKayUndercover



Category: The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:03:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27196220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/McKayUndercover/pseuds/McKayUndercover
Summary: A two-parter, Miranda's and Andy's perspectives on 21 days following the Paris events.Or how Miranda Priestly and Andy Sachs went through the 7 stages of grief and loss while taking 21 days to rid themselves of a habit.
Relationships: Miranda Priestly/Andrea Sachs
Comments: 37
Kudos: 216





	1. Miranda's 21 Days

**Author's Note:**

> The initial version of "21 Days" represented the first 3,000 words that I've ever put on the proverbial paper. As such, it was a very raw story, neither beta'ed, nor edited properly. 
> 
> I chose to take the first version of it down and to "enhance" it, first by begging my faithful and amazing beta @dianakanebooks to give it a polish, secondly, by adding some more detail to Miranda's side of things, and thirdly, by writing Andy's perspective, to give the story symmetry. 
> 
> The beautiful graphic - by the wonderful @onewritergirl
> 
> Title from an amazing song by Brian Fallon.

****

**Miranda’s 21 Days...**

####  **Or how Miranda Priestly went through the 7 stages of grief and loss while taking 21 days to rid herself of a habit**

_Days 1 – 3: Shock and Denial_

According to behavioral science, one needs 21 days to form a habit. Or to break one. Science is science, after all. There is no arguing with science, even if she is Miranda Priestly and she wants to try, just to see if once more the world will bend to her immense will. However, unlike the world, which occasionally does her bidding, science remains deaf to her influence and to her feeble attempts to change its laws. 

And so the Devil in Prada had to face some scientific truths. One, on that momentous Paris afternoon, Miranda became aware that she was an addict. And two, she’s an addict in dire need of rehabilitation since her drug of choice abandoned her with a careless toss of a phone into a fountain.

In true fashion of dealing with loss, and right according to science, Miranda proceeded with the stage of complete shock at her wayward assistant leaving her and subsequent denial of Andrea’s mere existence.

Andrea was erased from Runway as if she never existed. Emily and Nigel feared to utter her name. Heads were rolling left and right. The rampage Miranda Priestly went on when she returned from Paris became legendary, even by her own standards. 

Upon discovering an older email of Andrea’s in a chain being forwarded around regarding a planned spring photoshoot, Miranda proceeded to fire the clacker who dared to reply to the email chain, then moved on to firing the logistics personnel on the set of the photoshoot, then the models and finally the photographer. After some deliberation, she canceled the shoot altogether. 

Nigel did not show his face the whole three days and Emily cowered behind her desk in agonizing search for a new second assistant, since Miranda also fired all the candidates whom Emily had lined up so far. Their coffee delivery was slow, their voice was too loud, or too quiet, their attires were too atrocious, or too studied, and finally, the last one was a brown-eyed brunette, so obviously she was fired on the spot without having the opportunity to either open her mouth or deliver the coffee. 

Emily cried for an hour. Miranda thought that she really should’ve been quieter about it since she herself was hanging by a thread. And it served her right too, hobbling around on her crutches in Paris clothes which she obviously did not acquire herself. Emily deserved everything she got at this point. Simply because she wasn’t Andrea. 

_Days 4 – 7: Pain_

Something inside her tore on the fourth day. It was the brunette fired-on-the-spot almost-assistant that set off the next stage of the cycle. Staring aimlessly through her office windows, Miranda barely touched her coffee or her steak.

She was not a stupid woman and while absolutely not prone to introspection, she knew herself well enough to understand that her reaction or overreaction to Andrea’s departure was out of her normal. Whatever ‘normal’ might’ve signified for her. Firing fifteen people, sabotaging, and then canceling a shoot was rather drastic. Well, more drastic than her ‘normal’. 

Come to think about it, her overall attitude toward Andrea was outside of her normal. The girl managed to become indispensable, sure, but Miranda’s absolute need for Andrea went beyond the necessity for assistance in speedy delivery of quality hot coffee. She needed Andrea even after being so unceremoniously left, even after such a public affront. Surely Runway was abuzz with the gossip of the Devil not tearing strips off the foolhardy second assistant and not banishing her from the publishing world forever. Miranda needed Andrea and the fact that Andrea chose to leave her hurt Miranda deeply. She really didn’t like thinking about all the reasons why.

14 more days to break her habit. Miranda watched the small figures passing under her windows and her heart hurt, counting down the minutes.

_Days 8 – 12: Anger_

In observing the passersby, Miranda moved onto the next stage. A stage she found she enjoyed a whole lot more compared with the desolation she felt just days ago. Anger suited her much better. She reveled in anger. Anger meant action, no matter how destructive or petty or unnecessary her anger could get. 

Even from a distance, Miranda identified the lonely figure, standing unobtrusively across the street from Elias-Clarke, hunched against the cold or the wind or the rain. It was really difficult not to recognize the person, the long brown locks, the slouch of shivering shoulders, the faraway look in intelligent brown eyes. And the return to the horrid outfits that she wore prior to her Runway Nigel-delivered glow-up. 

Like clockwork, the figure would stand and try not to look too conspicuous while observing the comings and goings at Runway around 6 PM. How dare she? How dare she show her face in such a way when Miranda had not slept or eaten and continued to fire a clacker a day in her quest to rid herself of this addiction?

To spite her former assistant Miranda switched her going home time, but Andrea continued to stand vigil across the street. Out of sheer malice, Miranda waited for the Book herself, scaring the living daylights out of Emily and causing speculation among the staff. Still, there Andrea was at 11 PM, clutching a Styrofoam cup, standing huddled under a lamppost outside. The next day Miranda left at 1 PM and was in complete agony upon discovering that she did indeed best her former second assistant, for Andrea obviously did not consider that she might leave work early just to play games with her. Miranda’s disappointment at her own misplaced spirit of competitiveness, which robbed her of the chance to see those tired brown eyes, was immense. So immense, in fact, that during her evening perusal of the Book she fired a Junior Artistic Editor for something so innocuous as missing a comma. She was really reaching new heights every day when it came to dismissing clackers. 

The next day, Miranda exited the building at precisely 6 PM and witnessed the brown eyes light up with pleasure and excitement and a long-fingered hand lift in an awkward half-wave. Miranda smirked all the way to the Upper East Side.

She only had 9 more days to overcome this habit of hers. She was very close. 

_Days 13 – 15: Depression_

Miranda’s elation did not last, because Andrea did not return. As her wave went unremarked upon, Andrea stopped showing up at Elias-Clarke. No hunched shoulders, no trembling hands clutching at her cup, desperately seeking warmth. No brown eyes lighting up at Miranda’s exit. Miranda’s steak went straight into the trash and Emily’s next choice of second assistant was dismissed without Miranda even laying eyes on her. This was getting out of hand. Her mood shifted from angry, purposeful, and energetic in trying to get Andrea’s goat and beating her to the punch in their little cat and mouse game, to listless and lifeless. She kept asking herself what was the purpose of this game she was playing with her former assistant. A second assistant at that. A woman 25 years her junior. And a woman. God, a woman! The divinity was surely laughing hysterically at her at this point. Miranda Priestly and a woman half her age! 

So what was the game and why was she playing it? Surely it was all about ridding herself of this ridiculous habit. That had to be it. God, that really had to be it.

Five more days until she was done with this charade.

_Days 16 - 18: Upward Turn_

Cassidy crawled into her bed the other night, such a rare occurrence these past years, and sleepily asked her when Andy would be back. At Miranda’s shocked gape, the girl proceeded to cuddle up to her and tell Miranda that the twins liked the clumsy young woman. And that they missed the “silly” smile because “nobody should show that many teeth while being a gopher”. Yet, it turned out, the twins also missed talking to her over the rail of the staircase and hearing all about Runway and what funny stories and mishaps happened that week at various shoots and meetings. 

They apparently also had a whole convoluted arrangement and bets happening on how many cheese cubes Emily would eat on a particular day. Andrea would judiciously count them during the day and inform the twins about the tally when she delivered the Book. If they were asleep, she'd leave them a note, carefully hidden in the flowers. Every day a new wager would be recorded between them and Andrea would settle it each night as she visited the townhouse to finish her allotted nightly chores of laundry, messages, and delivering the Book. It seems Cassidy was often the winner and was currently missing lording this over her sister.

As the twin continued to murmur sleepily, curled warmly by her side, Miranda marveled at the close relationship Andrea had developed with her girls, at how quickly her infectious smile and sunny disposition wormed themselves into the hearts of the rather cynical twins and how just like their mother, the girls could not escape falling for a guileless smile and astute brown eyes.

Miranda supposed it was genetic then. This missing Andrea thing. This absurd, incomprehensible need for Andrea. And since it was genetic, it was meant to be. As she was discovering every day since Andrea left, one could not fight science. Genetics was some sort of science, wasn’t it? 

Because the twins missed Andrea, Miranda just had to bring the wayward fugitive back. Needs must and her daughters always got everything they desired. Miranda would see to it. Personally, this time. No use traumatizing Emily more than she already had, after all, she might quit eating cheese altogether, and then where would they all be?

Three days until she was free of this nonsensical addiction.

_Days 19 – 20: Reconstruction_

The tide was turning. Through denial, depression, and pain, Miranda felt inert, just drifting through the stages and counting down the days until her habit-breaking 21 days were up. She was just following science after all. But no more.

Spurred by the mother’s love for her children and her desire to always spoil them and get them everything and anything they wanted; Miranda was a whirlwind of action. It was a well-known fact that she’d do anything for her daughters. Well, if the “anything” in question happened to benefit her as well, who was she to deny herself said benefit? She was very pragmatic that way. Efficient to a fault. And maternal in this endeavor since she was doing it for her children.

Scaring HR into a mindless frenzy by demanding the personnel files of her last 20 assistants (make that 40, to ensure she covered her tracks entirely) and distracting Emily with more Calvin Kline skirts and Hermes scarves was fun. Sending Nigel on a short trip to London to deal with some sort of crises on that side of the pond since she believed he’d make an excellent Deputy Editor-In-Chief and that required a lot more responsibility and authority, was even more fun and felt righteous.

Nigel cried when she announced it, Emily clapped excitedly and even Miranda had something in her eye. She did not believe in atonement. Banish the thought. She was never wrong anyway and so there was nothing to ever atone for. But he had been with her for years. And he was her best employee. Maybe even her best friend. And she was very good at gestures anyway. Runway had never had a Deputy Editor-In-Chief. Elevating Nigel to a newly-created position made for a grand gesture indeed. If that meant appeasing him and keeping him close to her for the foreseeable future - well, two birds, one stone, and all that nonsense. 

Patting herself on the back, Miranda efficiently dispatched with Roy for the day and took a cab to the Lower East Side, following the address left on file by Andrea some eleven months ago. It was time for another gesture. Never be it said that she didn’t do her dirty work herself. Occasionally. If it was warranted.

It was so warranted. The surprise and warmth and sheer pleasure in the wide perspicacious brown eyes that peered at her through the chain gap of the partially opened door proved to her how warranted it all truly was. As Andrea hastily removed the chain and moved aside to let her in, Miranda disregarded the décor (appalling anyway, since this was the Lower East Side and nothing of any taste could be found in this geographical hellhole after all), the scent of brewing coffee (not that bad, perhaps the girl knew some things of taste after all) or the papers haphazardly spread through the shabby little living room (was Andrea employed already?). And why should Miranda notice any of the above, when Andrea was standing in front of her biting her ridiculously plump lower lip, running her hand through that ridiculously disheveled mane of hair, and trying to tug lower the hem of a ridiculously shabby t-shirt that was not even close to covering the length of her exquisite torso, since her ridiculously generous… wonderful… beautiful… (Miranda felt she needed to stay the course here because she was getting tangled in her own adjectives) breasts were pulling the holed rag upward despite Andrea’s best intentions. For her children… For her children… For her children… She was here on behalf of her children! Oh God, who was she kidding! It was all ridiculous and she herself was utterly ridiculous, but she was past the point of caring. 

Miranda was awfully grateful though that Andrea's well-intentioned endeavors were not successful, as the riding up t-shirt was uncovering a pair of skimpy boy shorts that really were too cute for their own good… Or for Miranda’s good… Or for Andrea’s good for that matter. As she continued her direct perusal of Andrea’s disarrayed appearance, two things became clear. Runway would have a spread on fashionably torn t-shirts and skimpy striped boy shorts, preferably in the next issue, and Miranda would have Andrea spread underneath her mouth. Preferably right now.

As she took a step closer to the disheveled figure, the clever brown eyes widened even more and the surprise in them was decidedly drowned by something that Miranda knew was mirrored in her own – longing. In fact, it belatedly became clear to Miranda that the look in Andrea’s eye wasn’t new. It was quite a surprise, that during the last months, especially since their work patterns had harmonized, this look had been there all along, that she had become accustomed to this look and expected to see it all the time. 

It was quite a revelation that this was her habit and her addiction all along, being looked on by this wondrous creature with longing and desire. With sheer unabashed want. Suddenly it was of urgent need to reach and grab and touch and kiss and taste and feast. It was imperative to feel the answering clutch of hands at her back and fingers in her hair, of tongue in her mouth tangling with hers.

One day to kick her habit. After all the strife, she was perilously close to something, she could feel it.

_Day 21: Acceptance and Hope_

In the end, what she could feel were her clothes being ripped off, her lips bitten and kissed by a rushed and avid mouth, and her shoulders being bruised by the threadbare carpet as she arched into a hungry caress of a lover devouring her. An inexperienced lover, but one who more than made up for it with enthusiasm and sheer greed to have as much of Miranda touched and licked and consumed.

When was the last time she was wanted like this? With such complete abandon? Miranda couldn’t remember. She couldn’t remember wanting this way either. Wanting until she moaned, until she shrieked, until she came in convulsions, screaming Andrea’s name while never breaking away from that longing gaze shining brightly in the afterglow. 

Though Miranda being Miranda and all things being equal, she couldn't wait. Just as she couldn’t wait for her coffee or for Patrick or for the skirts, Miranda couldn’t bask in the afterglow and wait for her turn. Whoever said patience was a virtue never saw Andrea Sachs in those ridiculously skimpy boy shorts and a t-shirt that was more holes than material sprawled on her back on the floor with her mouth glistening with the essence of Miranda herself. No, she couldn’t wait at all. Neither could she go slow, savor, or take her time. She waited for 21 days and it was past time she kicked this damn habit and got over her exhausting grief of losing this woman. This beautiful, enticing woman whom she now knew she craved more than steak or lattes or even Runway (since she was chiefly not at all editing the magazine during the last 21 days).

And so, Miranda set her mind, fingers, lips, and tongue to take and claim and mark and make Andrea come over and over and over again. Because if Andrea had left, surely Miranda could make her come back to her and come for her and damn all the puns, she was going to have this girl! And so, Miranda did. On the floor, on the sofa, against the wall on their way to the bedroom (because who could wait anyway) and against the bedroom door (because Miranda chose that moment to get down on her knees and take another taste) and then finally on the unmade bed the state of which Miranda did not notice, because who had time for things like that when she had four fingers in Andrea and her name was a litany on her lover's lips.

It ended with Andrea asleep on Miranda’s shoulder, breathing deeply, a sated smile playing on her lips through exhaustion, the same exhaustion mirrored in Miranda’s smirk that she couldn’t for the life of her shake. And why should she anyway, when a woman half her age was rendered completely boneless by the onslaught of pleasure Miranda had unleashed on her delightful body. 

And so Miranda Priestly felt smug and arrogant and so damn happy that it scared her. It also gave her hope. It gave her hope and acceptance that things had righted. That Andrea had returned to her, even if it was Miranda who made the actual drive to the Lower East Side. That Andrea was her lover now and it meant that this evening would have many other encores. That very soon her daughters and Andrea would be sitting in the kitchen laughing as they tried to guess the number of cheese cubes Emily consumed that day. And that later Andrea would accompany her to the bedroom where Miranda would exhaust her again before holding her while she slept.

It would all work out. Miranda was sure of it. Her self-discipline was unmatched when she put her mind to it. After all, Miranda thought as she ran her fingers lovingly through the tangled mahogany mane sprawled over her chest, it took her exactly 21 days to kick the odious habit of pinning for her runaway second assistant. And here she was - victorious, free of addiction and full of love. All she did was follow science and came out on top. Well, on the bottom too, but that was beside the point. Or was it? Coming while on the bottom was rather delicious in its own right. 

Still, she was rather happy with how it turned out, this science thing. Science was science after all.


	2. Andy's 21 Days

**Andy’s 21 Days...**

**Or how Andy Sachs lived through the 21 days of breaking a habit while going through the stages of grief in reverse**

Days 1 – 3: Acceptance

Science says that you can become addicted to something despite never quite getting a satisfactory hit of it. While goody-two-shoes Andy Sachs never tried hard drugs and wasn’t much for alcohol either, even she knew she was addicted to one Miranda Priestly long before that faithful Paris afternoon. She had accepted it. She even learned to live with the dissatisfaction of never quite getting the right kind of chemical in her system. Andy was always just a little bit on edge due to the fact that there was a gulf of difference between getting Miranda Priestly her coffee and getting MirandaPriestly off. Sadly she would never get to experience the hallucinogen that was a naked Miranda Priestly writhing under her mouth, so all she had left was the state of acceptance of her conundrum of lusting after one’s now-former boss in silence. 

Andy wasn’t sure when it started. Initially, she just plain detested this woman. For months she had nothing but hatred in her heart for anything that Miranda Priestly stood for. Her magazine, her ridiculous tight-fitting skirts, her uncomfortable heels that made her legs go for miles and made her calves look like they were just begging to be licked. Maybe Andy should have gotten a clue when she started having fantasies about licking up Miranda’s calves that her hatred of her boss was perhaps something else entirely. 

And so, despite all the imagined hatred, despite an office full of meddlesome gossipy people who were all too observant for their own good, Andy started watching Miranda like the sunflower watches the sun. Somehow she was always aware of where Miranda was in the room and even when she wasn’t, Andy instinctively oriented herself towards the entry point she would most likely emerge from. 

Andy just knew. It was becoming second nature. She knew and she accepted her own perpetual awareness of Miranda. Call it instinct, but it was just somehow in her blood to be aware of Miranda. Andy didn’t know how that happened or what it would result in, but the dangerous undercurrent of something like premonition would run up her spine and make her shiver. And that feeling of watching Miranda, of wanting Miranda, it was addictive. 

Andy wondered if Miranda had felt something too. Maybe Miranda didn’t know it just yet, but Miranda was not a stupid woman. And some things were becoming quite obvious pre-Paris. Like Miranda’s voice, for example. The duality was already there and was always present when it came to her second assistant. How she talked to Andy in public - certain, brusk, or even abrupt at times was very different from how she talked to Andy in private. The subtle change in tone, in intonation, the deference, the lowering of those impossibly long dark lashes, the quieting of the voice, the tremor in the cadence of words. 

Yet in Paris, watching her fall apart over that worthless man and then gather herself up and marshaling a defense worthy of the Queen of Fashion, Andy felt left behind by the hurricane named Miranda. Was she really addicted to a woman who could stab her best friend in the back and not even flinch? The woman who saw the same kind of qualities in her? 

Andy knew that she didn’t want this, that she wasn’t like Miranda at all. Thus she accepted that her lust, her addiction for Miranda was not something she would be able to handle. And therefore she left, she cried, and on the long flight from Paris to New York, she began her healing. 

Days 4 – 7: Reconstruction

Andy allowed herself to wallow just a couple of days. She burrowed in her Lower East Side apartment and slept. She called it rest and recuperation. Then she opened her computer and googled “How to break a habit” and simply followed the science. 

She got rid of all the Runway clothes by sending them to Emily via a courier, hoping that at least all the new couture would somehow pacify the redhead and erase the betrayal that stung both of them badly. And in her heart of hearts, Andy would prove to herself again that she was nothing like Miranda. 

Andy started a journal and chronicled her thoughts and feelings about everything and anything but the one person she wanted to write about but was told by science she needed to rid her thoughts off. 

She told herself often that she was rebuilding herself and thriving and who needed Miranda anyway with her heated looks and her subtle smile and her sexy walk? Andy could watch that walk forever, sliding her eyes from the swell of the calves to the curve of that irresistible ass. Predictably at mental images of Miranda’s ass, Andy’s not thinking about Miranda and thriving without Miranda would all go to hell in a handbasket and she’d either go for a long run or for a cold shower because masturbating to the thoughts of biting Miranda’s ass or spanking Miranda’s ass was just sinking to a new low. And so Andy didn’t, but she thought about it. 

Tears no longer came and she chucked that into the victory column. Andy applied to a slew of jobs at various newspapers and thought that it was time to go back to her roots. She was a journalist, not a lackey capable only of running and fetching. She was rebuilding herself, dammit, and she was just 14 days short of overcoming this ridiculous addiction. 

Days 8 – 12: Upward Turn

Andy was exercising and running more and more these days and she smelled of her vanilla shower gel a lot. Her mechanisms for not thinking about Miranda and absolutely not getting herself off to thoughts of Miranda were totally working. If she found herself jogging more and more by the Elias-Clarke building, she told herself it was pure coincidence. There was absolutely nothing to it. So she stopped occasionally across the street. It was just to take a breath or to grab a coffee to get her energy up. If she happened to see Miranda get in her car while she gazed at her from afar, what was the big deal? 

But her support group, the one she enrolled in to help her break her habit, told her that she was backsliding and letting her addiction win and so the day after waving at Miranda like a total moron, Andy stopped jogging by Elias-Clarke. She also stopped coming to the group meetings. She had her life together and was on an upward trajectory. She didn’t need anyone. Soon the job offers she applied for would garner some responses and she’d be busy and who wanted to see Miranda Priestly and her ridiculously sexy smirk anyway? 

Nine more days to overcome this habit of hers.

Days 13 – 15: Depression

When the next phase of reverse grief hit her, it found Andy on her couch playing Miranda solitaire. She placed her memories of Miranda like cards in front of herself and let the thoughts and feelings overwhelm her. The first card: Miranda’s mouth. Vicious and horrid and perfect and tender and wise. She laid the card carefully on the coffee table and tried not to imagine what that mouth would feel like under her own. She stared at the card and imagined all the things she would’ve done to that mouth. She remembered sitting in meetings that Miranda ran like a general running campaigns, and looking at that mouth and not really hearing any of the words. Just mesmerized by the movement of sensuous lips, the tongue peaking occasionally from behind perfect straight teeth. 

The second card: Miranda’s hands. Long-fingered and thin of wrist, they were delicate, yet Andy had a feeling they’d be strong, at times even rough, in equal measure gentle and teasing. What would that pale skin look like against her own? How would it feel against her breasts? How would those slim, agile fingers that held the fashion world at their tips feel thrusting into her, giving her pleasure, driving her mad?

As if awakening from a reverie, Andy would then shake her head, marvel at her own idiocy of imagining that Miranda would even remember one Andy Sachs not to mention allow a mere mortal like her to kiss her lips or lay those gorgeous hands on anyone as insignificant as Andy, who did not even deserve a fucking hand wave. 

She was depressed and she knew it. She could only hope that soon days would move faster and the nights would not be as long and as lonely as they now seemed. 

Just five more days.

Days 16 - 18: Anger

But the days didn’t move faster and the nights didn’t grow shorter or less lonely. On the contrary. November brought chill and rain and anger. Andy was angry at everything. At the idiotic note Emily deigned to send her calling her a “stupid cow” for daring to desert Runway. Andy set fire to the note and wanted to set fire to something else and was so ridiculously angry that she sent all the clothing to Emily because the desire to set the whole lot of them on fire was strong. 

Most of all Andy was angry at Miranda for burrowing into her mind and not letting go, despite everything science told her. This lusting for a woman twice her age was ridiculous. And lusting be damned, she was in love with Miranda Priestly! Miranda Priestly who haunted her nights and her days and her jogs and her showers! 

How maddening! Her parents would never approve, her friends, what remained of them, would ridicule her! And then Andy would get angry at her parents and at her friends for daring to approve or disapprove. And then she’d get angry at herself for having these ridiculous conversations in her head. Nobody was approving or disapproving anything. She was working herself into a royal snit over absolutely nothing. There was nothing to approve, Miranda didn’t care about Andy, Miranda forgot Andy even existed. And that totally and utterly sucked. 

Only three more days. Andy was really counting on science not letting her down because if things did not get any better she might just do something drastic like show up at Miranda’s doorstep begging to be put out of her misery. 

Day 19: Pain

And what a misery it truly was. Andy should have been happy. The Mirror invited her for a courtesy interview. Her Northwestern journalism degree coupled with her experience editing the University’s newspaper and running herself into the ground at Runway for almost a year was apparently more than enough for a New York news rag that was always on the verge of being closed due to unsustainability and lack of popularity of printed media. Greg, her new Editor-in-Chief, was nothing like her previous boss, and the huge discrepancy cut Andy in half. Tall, broad-shouldered, with a bald spot, he was also kind and said words like “thank you” and “please” and Andy thought that there was something twisted in her that craved a steely-eyed look and a curt “that’s all”. 

But was that all she craved? At night, when her thoughts were running wild in her head and her feelings were so big there was nowhere to hide from the enormity of the truth that Andy was trying to conceal during the day. She was in love with Miranda Priestly. The Mad, Bad, and Dangerous to Know Devil in Prada. And instead of her feelings going away in 21 days, Andy had a distinct suspicion that they only grew stronger, since she was forced now to acknowledge that despite nobody ever approving of the two of them, despite Miranda herself not even remembering that one Andy Sachs was walking the Earth, Andy would give up anything and everything for a chance. 

The impossibility of her wishes and hopes and dreams was so painful she’d choke on her tears and then scream into her pillow because her neighbors were bound to call the cops on her if she continued to carry on like that. 

Just two more days left for her to get over her addiction. Andy suspected that when it was all said and done she’d write a lengthy article, exposing what a bullshit theory the concept of 21 days really was. It didn’t work and screw it and why the hell was Miranda Priestly so impossible to get over? 

Days 20 - 21: Shock

And then on the last night of her failed 21-day experiment to get over her addiction to one Miranda Priestly, Andy opened the door and understood why she actually would never get over this woman, even if she had 21 million days and not just 21. 

There she stood in all her royal finery, a sable over her fragile shoulders and a sad expression on her face, and Andy was so shocked, so overwhelmed by the scent of her, the sight of her, the sheer presence of her. And Miranda just stared. She stared, and in her eyes Andy saw what she knew for certain was reflected right back in her own. Longing. Miranda looked at her with such unabashed naked longing it was breaking Andy’s heart. 

Time stopped. It was exactly like in the novels. Like in the movies, when the protagonists just drank each other in and looked with eyes full of love and lust. How was it even possible that Miranda Priestly, the Queen of Fashion and the Ice Queen herself could stand in the middle of her apartment and clearly try to undress Andy with her eyes? There was no other way to describe the heated, hungry look that followed every attempt of Andy’s shaking hand to tug down her ratty torn shirt or try to hide her boyshorts. 

And then time galloped, breakneck speed right from the gate and Andy found her arms full of Miranda. Arms, hands, lips, mouth... it was all a blur, a race to undress, to devour, to put her mouth on as many places as possible, to push down to the floor and spread those legs and not even have the patience to pull off the lacy panties, but to simply tug them to the side and feast. The first taste was a shock to Andy’s system because this was it, there was no turning back now. She would never be able to taste anyone else or do this with anyone else. This was heaven, this was hell because if Andy was addicted before, she would never ever recover now. 

However, Miranda was making delicious little noises and the pitch of her voice was only growing in volume and surely that meant that Andy was doing something right and so she dived in even deeper, bringing her fingers into play. She had no earthly idea what she was doing, but Miranda seemed to be enjoying herself immensely if the screams of “Please, there, yes, Andrea!” were any indication, and so Andy gave it everything she had and in no time at all the velvet walls were tightening around her fingers and Miranda was staring at her as she was coming and it was like looking at her future. This is what it would be, Andy decided right then and there. Making this woman come, every day, forever. Nobody else would ever do. 

Miranda apparently did not do afterglow and immediately Andy experienced what it was like to be fucked by the Devil herself. When she took, she took everything. There was no room to hide or hold back. Andy was pleasured within an inch of her life coming so many times, her throat was raw and her pussy was numb and her body could not take anymore but she was just so far gone the only thing she could whisper over and over again was her lover's name. 

Later she remembered them falling in a sweaty tangled heap on her bed and Miranda gently pulling the covers over them and holding her close, comfortably settling Andy on her shoulder and slowly lulling her to sleep by running those long, graceful fingers through her tangled hair. 

Just before sleep claimed her, Andy thought she gleaned a rather self-satisfied smirk on Miranda’s lips. She thought she could guess why Miranda was smirking, after all, twice her age and it was the older woman who literally fucked her almost unconscious. Andy thought that she’d have to do something to wipe that smirk off Miranda’s face, she really couldn’t let her have the upper hand. But even so, it was okay. Because Andy was addicted now and science could go hang, she never wanted to recover. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading! As always, you can drop me a line here or come talk to me over on Twitter @ mckayundercover, I'm always grateful for comments and impressions! 
> 
> My beta @dianakanebooks is a saint for her patience with me. Hope you feel all better soon, babes. 
> 
> Special thank you to @onewritergirl for the graphics and for the love and support! I appreciate you!

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to each and every one of you who read, like, or comment - your support keeps me going. 
> 
> @dianakanebooks - you're a star and I'm forever grateful to know you. 
> 
> @onewritergirl - you're wonderful and you always come through for me on the very short notice that I seem to always give you. 
> 
> I'm @mckayundercover over on Twitter in case you want to come over and talk to me about these two wonderful idiots in love! 
> 
> Andy's 21 Days to follow next Sunday!


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